Homeland

by John Jakes

  Herschel imagined various ways that he might deal with or outwit the authorities. He was confident that he could. His confidence completely drained away the moment Herr Blechman announced that they should be sighting “the Long Island” within forty-eight hours. Now they had to go through with it.

  He noticed that his new friend looked worried too. Like Herschel, Pauli the German burned with a desire to live in America. Soon, very soon, it would be decided whether they would or not.

  7

  Pauli

  AS RHEINLAND APPROACHED AMERICA, Pauli noticed the Messer brothers paying a lot of attention to him. He would look up in the dining saloon and see one or the other of them watching him. They idled near him on deck during the day. He knew the object of their interest was the money belt, which that damnable steward had surely mentioned to them. Pauli didn’t know what to do, except to make sure he was always with other people.

  At the same time, he was sleeping badly because he was getting sick. Fierce cramps stabbed his belly and there were wet rumblings in his bowels. He felt quarrelsome and glum. He noticed a similar mood in others. Passengers shouted at each other for no reason. They abandoned courtesy to push and shove to the dining tables or the washroom troughs. Several fist fights broke out among the men. To Pauli it was clear that they would all arrive on the threshold of America worn out and worn down, in no condition to face the ordeal that awaited.

  On the night before the promised landfall, a night of rising wind and exceptionally heavy seas, he could eat nothing for supper. Instead, he went reluctantly to the steward’s table near the dining saloon entrance and there bought a small tin can of warm beer. He was nauseated by the smells and the stifling, tobacco-choked air of the dining saloon. Did he dare go to the open deck?

  Herr Blechman was again writing in an account book, paying no attention to him. From the corner of his eye Pauli searched for the Messers. They were at their regular place, talking in their usual loud and oafish way. They were just about the only cheerful passengers. Pauli decided to chance it. He slipped out.

  He stopped at his bunk for the broken camera. He carried this and the can of beer up to the deck. To his relief, he found it totally deserted.

  The wind cleared his head and relieved a spell of dizziness. The ship was heaving and crashing through high waves under a cloudless sky full of crystalline stars. Above him, like an illuminated castle, the decks belonging to the rich passengers mocked the dark steerage with the glow of their electric bulbs. Any emigrants traveling on a more expensive ticket didn’t have to pass through the New York processing depot, Valter had explained. Only those arriving in steerage were screened there. “Because America wants no poor people who might become public charges.”

  Pauli sat with his back to the iron hull and his head well under the rail. There he sipped the warm beer. It calmed his stomach. He felt better almost at once.

  He began to toy with the Kodak, imagining himself a photographer hired to picture the dazzling milky sweep of stars over the ship. He was clicking off imaginary shots when he heard a faint metallic ring, then a footstep. Instantly tense, he glanced up. Two burly figures blacked out sections of the sky.

  “Here he is, Heine. Trying to hide from us.”

  “Just where Blechman said we might find him.”

  Heinrich Messer kicked Pauli’s outstretched foot. “Hallo, you little shit. Did you think you could dodge us forever?”

  Pauli scrambled to his feet but the brothers moved quickly to block an escape. Pauli backed against the rail. Franz said, “Blechman told us you bought beer from him.”

  “Right here it is,” Heinrich said, picking up the can. He drank the remainder. “Good, I was still thirsty.” He threw the can overside.

  “He said you bought it with money from that belt you wear. Care to loan us a few marks? We could use extra in New York, they say it’s an expensive town.”

  “I don’t have any more money.” Pauli’s face was hot from the lie.

  Franz grinned. “Is that right? You won’t mind if we check.”

  “Franz, look, he’s got that picture box, too.”

  “I’ve never seen one, give it here,” Franz said. Pauli hid the camera under his right arm. Franz kicked his shin. Pauli gasped, staggered, and Franz snatched the camera. Pauli lunged at him. Franz laughed and danced back. “Here, Heine, catch.”

  The brothers tossed the Kodak back and forth, whooping and taunting Pauli while he strained on tiptoe on the tilting deck, reaching for the flying camera.

  “We might let you have it if you hand over your money,” Heinrich said, holding the camera over his head. Driven to the limit, Pauli shouted, “Schmutziger Schweinehund,” and hit Heinrich in the stomach.

  Heinrich was unprepared for such a determined offense. The Kodak flew out of his hand and sailed overboard, lost the moment it struck the waves.

  Pauli couldn’t believe it. Open mouthed, he stared at the sea. Incredible rage exploded inside him. He clutched the rail, ready to push off and tear into them both, the hell with their size. A pounding blow from behind knocked his jaw against the teak rail. He bit his tongue and spat out blood.

  “Call me a dirty bastard, will you?” Heinrich kicked him in the small of the back. “Come on, Franz, he’s got it coming.”

  “Twice over, Heine, he’s a Jew-lover, too.”

  “You are dirty bastards, both of you,” Pauli shouted in German, staggering around and bringing his fists up. Franz kicked his shin again, then grabbed Pauli’s crotch and twisted. Pauli let out a yell; Franz laughed.

  Heinrich locked his fists together and swung them sideways, into Pauli’s ribs. Pauli flew prone on the deck.

  Franz knelt on Pauli’s back and pulled his shirt out of his pants. “Here it is.” He yanked, and the laces of the money belt broke. The belt scraped Pauli’s skin as Franz dragged it from under him.

  “Take the money,” Pauli gasped. “Just give me the letter from my sponsor, I need it for—”

  Franz Messer was on his feet, flourishing the belt. He kicked the side of Pauli’s head. Hot tears filled Pauli’s eyes. The Messers laughed and walked off.

  In a moment, Pauli heard a hatch door clang. He lay on the cold iron deck while the great ship crashed and creaked on toward America.

  At dusk next evening, Rheinland came within sight of a small vessel identified as the Ambrose lightship. Rheinland was a few hours ahead of schedule, hence the pilot wouldn’t be put aboard until morning.

  All of the steerage passengers who were up to it rushed to the deck, pointing and gesturing at scattered lights in the distance. In weary but excited voices they repeated one word: “America. America.”

  Pauli heard the cries while he was still down below. A man ran in to summon two friends from the miasma of the washroom. After days at sea, everything smelled of shit; every inch of floor, wall, mirror, basin was foul and sticky to the touch.

  “It’s America, hurry,” the man shouted to the others. They all ran out, leaving one occupant—Pauli. In pain that defied belief, he sat with his rear in the trough.

  He closed his eyes, cold but sweating. The spasms wouldn’t stop. He had no money. The letter from Uncle Joseph was gone. He was sick. The Americans turned back sick immigrants at the place of arrival, which they would reach tomorrow.

  Pauli dragged himself to the deck just at daybreak. Rain squalls blown by a north wind hid the horizon intermittently. There were rumbles of thunder.

  Rheinland was steaming into a broad channel between an island on the port side and a larger, dimly seen land mass to starboard. Gulls were chasing garbage dumped from the stern.

  Despite the thunderclaps and occasional gusts of rain, the deck was packed. Almost everyone was gray-faced from exhaustion, if not illness. Still, they wanted an early glimpse of their destination, and they seemed to think it necessary to bring their worldly goods with them for this. It made the small slippery deck all the more congested.

  Pauli managed to wedge in beside Valter o
n the port side. The old gentleman had brushed up his doorman’s uniform and combed his hair, which now gleamed with rain. With an expression of excitement he was reading from a small German-language guidebook. “This is called the Narrows. There are almost as many ships as in Hamburg.”

  It was true. Freighters carrying the flags of England, the Netherlands, Scandinavian countries, Pauli’s own homeland could be seen moving in and out of the harbor behind the low rain clouds.

  Pauli dashed rain from his eyes and saw, directly ahead, a thicket of tall buildings spanning a quarter of the horizon. “New York,” someone cried. There was handclapping. An elderly woman sat down on her roped suitcase and burst into tears.

  Pauli still felt dizzy, drained, dangerously weak. He fought it. He had to stay alert; devise a plan. Worse than having no money was having no proof of sponsorship by his uncle in Chicago. What if the authorities denied him entrance? All this way for nothing …

  He wouldn’t let it happen. Weak and sick as he was, he would win through somehow.

  Suddenly old Valter tugged his sleeve. “Look, Pauli, look! It’s your picture card come to life.”

  And then Pauli forgot everything except the sight of the colossus rising ahead.

  In all his dreams he had never imagined her so tall and mighty. She towered to the sky, seemed to float slowly and majestically toward him. The low-hanging clouds hid the island on which she stood, but he could see part of her base, a giant stepped pyramid of concrete, and above that, her pedestal of granite.

  Valter too was transported, reading eagerly from his book.

  “The island is called Bedloe’s, an old army fort. She was placed there six years ago; she is the tallest statue in the world, three hundred five feet. That is ten times taller than Michelangelo’s statue of David, almost three times taller than the Great Sphinx of Giza.”

  Pauli trembled as he gazed at her. Her robe and her face, her torch and her crown were a deep reddish brown, agleam with rain.

  “She was created by the sculptor Bartholdi, but her inner skeleton was designed by the great engineer, Eiffel,” Valter read breathlessly. “There are seven rays on her crown to represent the seven seas and seven continents. On the tablet, in Roman numerals, there is inscribed the date America won its independence. July 4, 1776.”

  She was almost opposite the prow, and Pauli wanted to sob and yell and somehow reach up to embrace the magnificent woman whose strong yet kindly face was already gazing past them, out beyond the stern of Rheinland, out to the vast ocean, searching for the next newcomers. Wind streamed the rain from her crown, blew it into her eyes. But she seemed stronger than all the forces battering her, strong enough to withstand any storm …

  In the ecstasy of the moment, Pauli twisted completely around to watch the statue moving astern. Valter peered at the little book. “There are broken chains at her feet. She is striding ahead, free of the shackles of tyranny. We can’t see that. We’re on the wrong side, and too low.”

  The mighty statue floated away in scudding mist clouds. “Germania our mother—Columbia our bride,” Valter said. “I heard that many times in Hamburg. Germania our mother—Columbia our bride. You grow up and you leave your family to take a wife. You’ll always look back, but you can’t go back.”

  Rain dripped from Pauli’s eyebrows, nose, chin. He wiped his eyes. A lump filled his throat. Germania our mother—Columbia our bride. He wouldn’t forget that, or anything else about this momentous experience. Here, in the new land, he would find a home, and a calling.

  A sputtering engine attracted everyone’s attention. A trim steam cutter bearing official insignia pulled alongside. Rheinland lowered a midships gangway to receive three men in uniform. Valter said, “Those are the immigration officials.”

  “For us?”

  “No, the passengers upstairs. We’re going there.” He pointed off to port, where a gap in the low clouds revealed another small island dominated by a large buff-colored wooden structure. The building was two or three stories high, with a peaked roof of blue slate and four sharply pointed towers at the corners.

  “It looks like a spa or hotel,” Pauli said.

  “On the outside maybe.” Valter leafed through his little book. “It was built as a replacement for the older station, Castle Garden. It has only been open since January. It’s called Ellis. Ellis Island.”

  As the morning advanced, Rheinland steamed up the Hudson River past the incredible sprawl of wooden and brick buildings that comprised the city of New York. The wind was finally blowing away all the rain clouds, bringing first occasional patches of blue sky and then cool dry air, and a brilliant sun.

  With tugboats to assist, Rheinland tied up at one of the long wooden piers. A German band, men in Alpine hats, white blouses, lederhosen, played welcoming music. Herr Blechman appeared, nattily buttoned up in his uniform with the flying stag patch. He carried a megaphone.

  “Travelers,” he announced in German. “While the regular passengers disembark, you will be allowed onto the pier, but you must remain in that roped enclosure. No pushing, no shoving, be sure to remove all of your personal belongings because you will not be returning to the ship.”

  A woman called, “Is the pier America?”

  “Yes, you’ll be standing on the soil of a new country for the first time. And who knows? Perhaps the last.”

  “Nasty man,” Valter said above the sudden hubbub: people snatching up their grips, their bundles, rushing and shoving toward the port and starboard stairs.

  Valter and Pauli went down the steerage gangway together. The moment Valter stepped on the pier he stopped, braced his legs, pulled Pauli in front of him to protect him. People shoved by on either side. Valter’s face was lifted to the sunshine.

  “Feel it under your shoes, Pauli. Feel it and remember. Wednesday, the first of June, 1892. A most significant day, never forget it.”

  “I won’t, how could I?”

  Others were buffeting them and complaining from behind. They moved on.

  The wooden pier was still wet from the rain. Burly policemen with clubs herded them into the large rope enclosure. Other policemen stood guard around the perimeter. Near Pauli, the Wolinski children huddled around their mother, who was sobbing and swaying as though on the point of collapse. Herschel flung his new friend a despairing look.

  Pauli felt remote from all of it. Thrilled to stand on American territory, yes, but dreadfully afraid because he still had no plan for getting past the authorities.

  Then, just when he felt most hopeless, he thought of something disarmingly simple. He dove into his grip and retrieved Englisch für Reisende. He turned pages and with agonizing slowness picked out words, to construct phrases, which he began to repeat under his breath.

  “What are you saying?” Valter asked while packing his pipe.

  “Something to tell the authorities.” Pauli repeated the phrases.

  Valter waved his pipe toward the river. “Well, you’ll soon see them. Here comes the vessel for Ellis Island.”

  A small harbor ferry and five open barges were required to carry all the steerage passengers. Another stampede occurred when the ferry tied up at the end of the pier. “Line up, get in line, don’t run,” the policemen yelled, with little effect.

  Pauli and Valter were a good way back in line, near the Wolinskis. Soon the ferry was full; men closed her stern gates and cast off. As soon as the ferry chugged into the river, the first barge docked.

  The sun grew hotter. The line moved slowly. The newcomers were sweaty and uncomfortable in their heavy clothes. There were complaints about hunger; only stale rolls had been served for breakfast. Pauli repeated his phrases silently at frantic speed.

  At the front of the line, officials dealt with the immigrants one by one, using manifests provided by the ship. Each manifest had a number. Individual lines were likewise numbered. The officials checked off names and flung a paper tag at each new arrival, hectoring them in English until they got the idea that they must hang the t
ag somewhere on their person. Pauli’s tag said 8—11. Manifest number eight, line eleven.

  On Ellis Island, the barge tied up at an esplanade running along the front of the main building; the empty ferry was backing past them into the main channel. The moment a starboard plank was swung out from the barge, another mad exodus began. Pauli and Valter were buffeted toward the main doors, urged along by uniformed officials shouting, “Into the baggage hall, hurry up.” Behind Pauli, a woman said, “They look like police.” In Europe, police meant terror; the enemy; a knock on the door in the night.

  Suddenly disoriented by darkness, Pauli found himself in a vast, gloomy hall with a wide staircase rising in the center. The hall smelled of fresh paint and new lumber. Other officials were waving numbered cards and screaming, “Manifest 2 this way, step lively,” or “Manifest 11 here, you can leave your baggage.”

  Pauli heard a man say, “I’ll not leave my valuables for thieves to pick over, I’m carrying them.” But Pauli and Valter took a chance and piled their luggage in a roped enclosure over which hung a placard bearing a big black 8. The officials kept shouting. “Fall in at the foot of the stairs. Stay with your group!”

  The baggage hall quickly filled with the odors of dirty bodies and clothing. Pauli kept repeating his phrases. The groups moved slowly up the stairs. Old Valter was on Pauli’s left, the Wolinskis in the group ahead. Pauli heard a new sound from above. A buzzing and humming of hundreds of voices.

  Shafts of sunlight from high arched windows reached into the top of the stairwell. Valter tugged Pauli’s arm sharply, to show him a number of Americans wearing military-style caps and blue uniforms with epaulets. They stood along the railings beside the head of the stairs, observing the crowd.